Wrecking With A Pinch of Sugar
by Devumaru
Summary: Because of summer vacation, Litwak's Arcade has been filled with players playing the arcade games from day to night. Vanellope is distressed by this because they've been taking her free time to go hang out with Ralph. She wants to get Ralph something the next time they hang out. A mysterious candy gives her something to "upgrade" Ralph's game. The upgrade doesn't go as planned...


_**Chapter 1: Making A System Upgrade?**_

"Ahhgh!", a young girl exclaimed in frustration as she pushed the pile of papers in front of her, causing them to fly about the room.

She glared at her cute, pink desk for a little before sighing and walking around her large room to pick up the various papers scattered across the floor. As she bent over to pick up the papers, a lock of her candy-covered black hair, tied by a piece of licorice into a small hair bun, fell in front of her face before the girl put it back in its place. After gathering all the pieces of paper she had thrown off her desk, she stood up straight and started to dust off her way-too fancy and frilly pink and white dress.

The young girl walked over to her desk and placed the papers down on it, then moved over to her large window, that just so happened to be two large glass doors as well. At least, they were large in comparison to her small stature. She gazed out towards a beautiful night-enveloped land, covered with mountains of sweets and sours. This land is mostly known by its citizens and its fan as 'Sugar Rush'. At this time, the citizens of 'Sugar Rush' were all resting in their homes; it was probably more than likely that the young girl looking down at 'Sugar Rush' from her pure marshmallow-white castle was the last person to still be awake.

 ***Knock, Knock, Knock!***

' _Guess someone else is awake too',_ the girl thought to herself as she turned towards her graceful and white-colored door; it's edges hugged by the pink and red diamond patterned wallpaper covering the room.

"Come in!", she yelled.

At the sound of her command, the door opened, revealing a living green jawbreaker, with its eyes half-opened and nonchalant.

"Is something the matter, President Vanellope? I heard you yell", the jawbreaker asked apathetically.

The girl, or Vanellope, wasn't bothered at all by the jawbreaker's tone of speech but looked away from said jawbreaker.

"Sorry about that, Sour Bill. I was just… frustrated with all this paperwork lately."

"You can finish the rest of it tomorrow if you wish", the jawbreaker known as Sour Bill suggested.

Vanellope scoffed and turned to look at Sour Bill. An annoyed look was on her face, though it was obvious to Sour Bill that it was not aimed at him whatsoever.

"That's not the point!", Vanellope exclaimed, "All of this paperwork and for what? Allowing secret cheat codes to be programmed in?! Making more recolored skins for the racers?! This is stuff that 'Sugar Rush' is fine without. But I still have to sit here and "veto" this stuff, or whatever! And even if I do want to let something pass, the House of Sweetness or the Sours reject it before it even gets to me! It's just an endless loop of requests for laws being juggled back and forth and being rejected eventually, only for the citizens to request it again! The citizens won't take the time to try and understand our government, and The House, the Sours -We never agree on anything!"

On that last note, Vanellope stomped her foot on the ground and glitched over to her large and fancy bed, ending up under her bed's red covers. Sour Bill sighed and walked a bit closer to Vanellope's bed, albeit not too close to respect her personal space.

"Is that the only reason you're angry, President Vanellope?", Sour Bill asked.

Vanellope was silent. Sour Bill stood patiently near the foot of her bed for Vanellope to answer. Before long, Vanellope sat up, using her sheets to cover herself like a hooded robe would. She stayed facing away from Sour Bill but shyly spoke.

"It's been a few weeks since I've seen Ralph, Sour. The last time I saw the guy in person was at Sonic's celebration for his new game, Sonic "Crazyhog" or something. I… I miss him. Things have been boring around here without him, you know?", she said with an embarrassed blush on her face.

Sour Bill nodded with understanding.

"You're right, Ms. President. We have not seen Ralph for a while. Our citizens miss seeing him as well."

Sour Bill noticed Vanellope shifting in her covers in a nodding movement.

"However", Sour Bill continued, "you have to understand that it is that time of year again, where the players have much more free time to come to the arcade. There's not much time for either of you to come visit each other."

Vanellope slumped down in disappointment.

"I know it's summer vacation and everything… But can't Ralph and I just have at least one day to go hang out? I mean, we don't even get to hang out after closing hours because we're both so tired! Not to mention all this paperwork I have! It's not fair!"

Vanellope grabbed one of her fluffy white pillows and began to smack it against her bed repeatedly. Sour Bill sighed and cleared his throat to get Vanellope's attention. She stopped her relentless attack on her bed and pillow and looked over at Sour Bill with a confused and tired look. Although Sour Bill still had an emotionless expression on his face, Vanellope could see a glimmer of kindness in his eyes.

"I'm sure Ralph misses you greatly as well, President Vanellope. But you can't afford to let your longing for Ralph affect your duty to the kingdom. We need you to lead us, Ms. President."

Vanellope blushed a bright red.

"I-I'm not longing for Ralph! I just miss hanging around him, okay?"

Vanellope took the covers off of her body and hopped off her bed. She cleared her throat, making Sour Bill stand at attention.

"But don't worry, Sour. I'm not going to let this get in the way of my work. I promise."

Sour Bill nodded.

"Alright, President Vanellope. You should rest now. You can finish the rest of the paperwork tomorrow."

"Okay, Sour Bill. You should get some rest too."

Sour Bill nodded and started to leave the room.

"Wait, Sour!"

Sour Bill turned back to Vanellope.

"Yes?"

Vanellope smiled at him.

"Thank you for talking with me."

Sour Bill nodded, supposedly his way of smiling.

"You're welcome, Vanellope. Good night."

Sour Bill opened the door and left the room. Before the door could close, Vanellope held the door open and looked out the room towards him.

"Good night!", she yelled before shutting the door to her room.

Vanellope sighed as her room went back to being completely as silent as the night. She walked over to her fancy and large two-door dresser and took out her pajamas for bed, which happened to be what she wore during her time as an outcasted glitch of 'Sugar Rush': a blue hoodie with a large front pocket, a dark brown skirt that seemed reminiscent of a certain circular chocolate wrapper, and blue matching stockings with white stripes that were similar to that of a candy cane.

These days it was hard for her to sleep without wearing her casual attire; Vanellope got too used to sleeping in the same clothing for so long after all, even if she were originally the 'Princess'. Besides, it made her feel happy whenever she wore this. Not only was it her racing suit, it was also the attire she wore when she first met Ralph. It felt like an eternity to her since the time he randomly flew into 'Sugar Rush' in one of those spaceship thingies from 'Hero's Duty'.

Although at the time, Vanellope was literally homeless and just trying to do everything she could just to race once alongside the other racers, she will always cherish the memories she made during that time with Ralph. It was funny how even with her stealing Ralph's medallion and using it as an entry ticket into one of the races run by the former ruler and hijacker of 'Sugar Rush', King Candy, he still chose to help her not only get a kart but also help her out with learning how to drive it. He helped her, even though he was supposed to be just a bad guy.

Vanellope shook her head with a smile. She knew that it didn't matter whether Ralph was a good guy or a bad guy in his game. What mattered the most was what he did for her. And what he did was basically help save her kingdom from being under the rule of a character that didn't even belong in the game. To her, Ralph was more hero than any other good guy she knew.

Vanellope began to take off her fancy princess attire and put on her casual clothing. Once she was fully dressed in her normal attire, she neatly folded her princess dress and placed it inside her dresser, along with her cute, red tiara. Once she took off her tiara, she made her small hair bun extend into a ponytail to get comfortable, and closed her dresser. Before Vanellope went to her bed to get some well-deserved rest, she walked over to her window once again, only to actually open one of the doors and step out onto the balcony. She looked up to the sky to look out of her game's screen, giving her a good look at "Fix-It Felix Jr." and it's game machine. It was dark right now, which told her that everyone was probably asleep now in their game. With a longing look in her eyes and a sad expression on her face, Vanellope put her hands into her hoodie's front pocket.

"Good night, Ralph... I hope we can see each other soon", Vanellope whispered to herself.

Vanellope walked back into her room and looked behind her to see Ralph's game one more time that night before closing her large window door and heading off to bed.

* * *

"*Yawn*!"

A large, behemoth of a man sat up and stretched out his arms. He smacked his lips and got off of his basically destroyed bed. As soon as he stood up, he slammed his head against his own ceiling.

"Agh! Ouch… Dang, it, I need to make this place a little bigger", the large man said, rubbing his forehead in an attempt to soothe his short pain.

He yawned again and walked towards his sink. As soon as he reached his sink, his eyes were drawn to a piece of paper taped up on the mirror above his sink. He smiled as he read the words on the piece of light blue and candied-stickered paper.

' _Make sure you brush your teeth two times a day, fart-breath! Once in the morning and once at night!_ '

At the very bottom of the paper was a very crude and messy signature from "Vanellope Von Schweetz". To anyone else, the words on the paper would have been seen as rude and uncalled for. But for this man, those words were playful and cute to him. He chuckled as he reached for and grabbed his toothbrush, put a good amount of toothpaste on it and proceeded to brush his teeth.

It wasn't long before the man spit out the toothpaste in his mouth and filled up a small glass cup with water from the sink, which he used to rinse his mouth and spit out any leftover toothpaste stuck in his mouth. He made sure to be careful with the glass cup that seemed like a tea-cup in his massive hands. After he felt like he got all the toothpaste out of his mouth, he placed the cup gently onto the area surrounding the sink. He looked at himself in the mirror with a small sense of pride at the fact that he somewhat cleaned himself. Feeling that he cleaned himself enough, instead of washing his face or tidying his messy bed hair, he walked away from the sink and to the front door of his small shack. He didn't feel like he needed to change clothes or anything since he was wearing his work clothes as pajamas anyway, which was an orange shirt and brown overalls with only one strap left on it. He also didn't feel the need for shoes, since most shoes weren't made in his size, as his feet were also very large. So he preferred to be barefooted.

Before he walked out his front door, he stopped and faced the wall next to it. On that wall was a picture of him standing as formal as he could with Vanellope on top of his shoulders hugging his head. Right under the picture was a small stand that had a heart-shaped blue cookie on it. Upon closer inspection, the cookie had a pink lanyard attached to it and had the words, written in white frosting, "You're my hero", on it.

The large man grinned, looking at the picture of him and Vanellope.

"Good morning, kid. Good luck to ya' today, like always."

The large man opened the front door and walked out to a nice looking, suburban area, beautifully lit up by the glow of the light coming from the outside of his game's screen. He shut the door behind him and took a deep breath of fresh air, enjoying the warmth of the morning glow. Before he could do anything else, he heard a voice call out to him.

"Ralph! Good morning, brother!"

The large man, or Ralph, looked towards the sound to see a man, who was definitely smaller than him, walk up towards him. He was in a light blue uniform with a white t-shirt underneath it, blue denim jeans, and a pair of brown gloves and shoes. He also had a belt on with the shiniest golden hammer attached to it. The color of his hair was a light brown, but it was covered with a blue hat that matched his attire perfectly. Ralph noticed that there was a large kiss mark on the side of the smaller man's face, but decided to ignore it for now. He looked towards the man heading happily.

"Good morning, Felix. Ready for another day of fixing?"

Felix grinned and patted Ralph's side.

"As long as you're ready for another day of wrecking, buddy!"

The two laughed at their inside joke like old friends for a little. When Felix was done laughing, he looked behind Ralph and at his small shack with a concerned look.

"You sure you don't want me to fix up your place for you? It's kinda' small for you, Ralph", Felix asked.

Ralph crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow jokingly at Felix.

"Are you saying that I'm fat, Felix? Because I'm not fat. I'm just programmed to be big, okay?"

"Oh gosh, that's not what I'm saying at all, Ralph!", Felix laughed, "I'm just saying that you should live in a place that fits your needs. You know it's no trouble to me at all. I mean, I was the one who built Qbert and his friends their places, right?"

Ralph chuckled and scratched the back of his head.

"I know it's no problem to you, Felix. But, I think I'm okay with my small shack. I've always been known for wrecking stuff, so it feels nice to build something myself. It's kind of a way of me saying to myself that I'm more than just a wrecker. That I'm more than just a bad guy, you know?"

Felix smiled warmly at Ralph.

"Vanellope's really changed you, Ralph, you know that?"

"Yeah. You just can't not be affected by a kid. Especially a kid like her."

"I'm glad to hear that, brother. Well, if you ever do need my help fixing it up, don't be afraid to ask, okay?"

"Alright. Thanks, Felix."

Felix nodded happily and the two began to walk over to the Niceland Apartment Complex, spotting some of the Nicelanders themselves. Before anyone could greet each other, they heard the sound of a click and their game starting. Everyone quickly ran to their places, including Ralph and Felix.

"Oh shoot! Already?! *Sigh*", Felix exclaimed as he ran to his position, "I can't believe I'm saying this, Ralph, but I need a huge break from this game after the players stop coming to the arcade so much."

"Agreed", Ralph stated, "I need to go visit Vanellope soon. It's been awhile since I've seen her, and she doesn't like it when we're separated for too long."

Felix chuckled softly. Hearing that Ralph still thought about Vanellope even with all of the work that they had to do was heartwarming.

"Do you miss Vanellope, Ralph?", Felix asked as he stood in his familiar stance for the player to start to control him.

Ralph sniffed lightheartedly and started climbing up the large apartment complex.

"Of course I do, Felix. I can't help thinking about the kid sometimes. I'm worried she's causing trouble for her people or whatever", he whispered to Felix, loud enough for him to hear but not allowing the player to hear him.

Felix chuckled and felt the player start to control his movements. He followed suit with the loud whispering that Ralph was doing.

"Haha, I understand you brother. I miss my sweet honeydrop~! I can't stop thinking about her. I hope she's doing fine in her game."

"Oh yeah, Calhoun! Have you been able to visit her lately, Felix?", Ralph asked as he began to destroy the Niceland Apartment Complex, causing bricks to rain down onto Felix's head.

"Every once in awhile I get to, yeah. Just last night actually I made some time to go see her. It was really great for the both of us. She missed me a lot more than I expected", Felix said as he dodged the bricks Ralph had caused to fall down.

Ralph smirked jokingly.

"Oh, really? I can see that honestly. There's a kiss mark on your face after all. Did something fun with her?", Ralph asked, with the smirk still on his face as he smashed down onto the building again.

Felix immediately blushed at Ralph's statement and question and brushed away the kiss mark on his cheek

"R-Ralph! Are you implying something? Because if you are, I would like you not to do it in front of the play- OUCH!"

When Ralph had asked Felix that question, Felix had unconsciously taken control of his own body away from the player, causing him to get hit by one of Ralph's bricks. Ralph couldn't help but laugh out loud. Once Felix respawned, he pouted and felt himself be controlled once again by the player, who thought nothing of the fact that he lost control of Felix for a little. He jumped up to a window, which happened to be one where Mary, one of the Nicelanders, was waiting. As soon as they locked eyes, Mary smiled devilishly and gave Felix one of her pies, granting Felix temporary invincibility and the ability to fix every broken window in the form of a fast-moving tornado.

Ralph was caught off by this.

"Hey! Mary! Come on!", Ralph blurted out in shock, "Don't give the pie so early in the game! We barely started!"

Felix laughed at Ralph's reaction and watched as he climbed up higher on the building and started breaking it apart again. The player used the most of Felix's power up as much as they could before it ran out, netting them a lot of points. Felix felt the power up leave his body, so the player used their quick wits to avoid the onslaught of bricks falling towards him once again.

"And for your information, Ralph, I didn't do anything crazy with Calhoun last night. We just had one of our nice snuggles. As always, it was the warmest thing I've ever experienced~! Oh, I love her so much~!"

Ralph jokingly gagged at Felix's love for his wife. Felix, noticing this, had to hold back a strong laugh for fear of the player thinking the game is bugged.

Ralph chuckled as he smashed more bricks down again at Felix.

"Any plans for when you guys go on that break you talked about earlier?"

Felix barely dodged another one of the bricks before looking up to Ralph.

"Oh yeah! I wanted to take her to one of those new beach arcade games they installed recently. It seems like a great place to relax and let loose. I want to try my hand at some volleyball."

Ralph raised an eyebrow at Felix, intrigued by Felix's plans.

"That actually sounds nice. I wonder if Vanellope with like to go to the beach."

"I think kids like to do anything, to be honest, brother. Would you like to come along with us?"

Ralph was shocked at Felix's question and almost forgot to drop the next round of bricks.

"But, Felix! I'd hate to get between you and Calhoun. You guys need that alone time together."

"Hahaha, Ralph, it's no problem. She and I both know that you and Vanellope have barely gotten any time to hang out. It's not good for you two to spend so little time together."

Ralph blushed embarrassedly.

"I know. I should hang out with her more. I work too hard sometimes, haha."

Ralph smashed the building as hard as he could, breaking some more windows for Felix to fix, which he did quickly thanks to the fast reactions of the player.

"So, you coming along, buddy?", Felix asked.

"If you'd let us come along, I'm sure Vanellope and I would love to go with you two!"

"Great! I'll ask Calhoun about it the next time we meet up again. I'm sure she'll be happy to let you guys join us."

"Alright! But don't worry, Felix. If we do come along, I promise to bring Vanellope to another part of the beach so you and Calhoun can have some alone time", Ralph said, winking at Felix, who blushed, but appreciated Ralph's promise.

Eventually, the two reached the top of the building, where Ralph had nowhere else to run. Felix watched as the Nicelanders reached the top of the building as well, and got in position to throw Ralph off the building, with Mary giving Felix the usual kiss on the cheek and the medal flying around Felix's neck. Ralph gave them a quick thumbs up before hopping onto their hands on his back.

He was looking forward to this part of the game in hopes that when the Nicelanders lift him up, he'll be able to sneak a peek over to the 'Sugar Rush' game cabinet and wave to Vanellope. They really haven't seen each other in person for a while, so just being able to wave at each other was always a nice substitute.

Unfortunately, when the Nicelanders lifted him up, instead of seeing Vanellope as the winner, he saw Rancis Fluggerbutter holding the gold trophy that the racers would get at the end of the race for winning first place. Ralph sighed, but happily waved at the butter-colored hair boy. As soon as Rancis noticed Ralph, he excitedly waved back at Ralph. Ralph couldn't help but chuckle at Rancis's enthusiasm. Soon, Ralph felt himself be thrown off the building, and he gave one of his trademark screams right before he landed in the mud next to the building.

Ralph picked himself off of the mud and looked towards his game's sky, smiling.

"Hope you're doing well, kid. I'll see you soon, I promise."

* * *

*A Few Weeks Later*

Vanellope sighed as she kicked her feet. At that moment, she was sitting on one of the branches of a candy cane tree in the dusk of night, right above a swamp of taffy that was way too sticky. A good amount of time had passed since her outburst to Sour Bill, and even then, she only saw glimpses of of her gorilla-like friend. They still weren't able to hang out, and it was starting to eat away at her. Even though she should have had her fill of being social with all her racing friends and political opponents, there was no doubt that Ralph fulfilled a certain need she had. There was something that Ralph had that meant a lot to her that none of the residents of 'Sugar Rush' had. She didn't know what it was… But she missed it so much.

She brought her hand to her nose and brushed it, causing her to sniff. Vanellope felt like crying. Although she had matured a lot since her time as just the glitch of 'Sugar Rush', she was still just a kid. And like all kids who really want to spend time with their best friends, they get impatient.

Vanellope sat against the tree and tucked in her hands in her front pockets. It wasn't too cold that night, but her hands could use some warmth. Lately, Vanellope has been spending a lot of her time away from the castle, mostly at night. The room she had in her castle was nice and all, but it still didn't feel like home to her. It was more of a vacation home you would live in for just, well, the vacation. Vanellope still felt drawn to her old home in the Diet Cola Mountain. But it had gotten destroyed when Ralph smashed down all the mentos into the burning hot diet-cola in order to save Sugar Rush from the Cy-Bugs.

She looked down from her branch and focused her attention on the kart she and Ralph had built together. Even though he was reluctant to help her at first, Vanellope could tell that he had loads of fun building that kart with her. She knows she had a lot of fun. Looking at that very kart now made her smile. It was the single-handedly most awesome thing anyone had ever done for her. In general, Ralph's given her the most awesome things anyone's ever given to her. He saved her from being bullied from the other racers, then he helped her make and even learn how to drive her kart, and if that wasn't enough, he gave her the chance at being more than just an outcast in a game that she's always belonged in. Ralph did all of this for her. And all she gave him was a medal she made using the sweets that's everywhere around her...

Vanellope sat up with a figurative light bulb above her head, and a large smile on her face in the first time in what felt like forever. She stood up on the branch with a newly revived enthusiasm.

"Maybe that's why I've been so down whenever I think of Ralph!," Vanellope said with realization, "I do miss the guy and all, but I've never felt this down in the dumps before. I think it's because I feel like I owe him much more than just a crummy medal!"

Vanellope put her hand under her chin in a thoughtful manner.

"I need to get him something amazing. Something that can make smile every day! He gave me the chance to be more than what everyone said I am. I want… No. I need to get him something great! But… what?"

"I can help you with that!"

"Whoa!", Vanellope screamed, almost falling off her branch and into the gooey taffy below her.

Vanellope readjusted herself and looked down a branch to see a lone candy citizen; specifically a mint candy with a red spiral in the middle, and a strange, glitched out-looking eye. It waved up at her with a smile, ignoring the fact that it had just spooked her.

Vanellope jumped down to the branch that the mint was on and faced it with a skeptical look on her face.

"Who… are you? And why are you eavesdropping on your president? That's a national offense, you know?"

Upon closer look, Vanellope saw that the strange, glitchy eye that the mint candy had consisted of a bunch of digital-looking squares and coding numbers. It chilled Vanellope to the core. The eye looked too digital and machinelike for her liking.

The mint candy did a small bow.

"Sorry about that, President Vanellope. I saw you walk out here by yourself earlier when I was on my way home, and I got worried. Good to know that you were only worried about Ralph."

Vanellope blushed a bright red at the mint's comment on her thinking of Ralph.

"I-I-I was not worried about Ralph. I was just thinking about him. A-And you still didn't answer my first question!"

"My apologies, Ms. President. My name is Pep Mint. You can call me Pep though. I'm just a humble citizen of 'Sugar Rush'. But I'm not the important thing right now. What's important now is-"

"What happened to your eye?", Vanellope interrupted.

Pep visibly flinched at Vanellope's question before shaking itself calm.

"My eye was… damaged when one of the Cy-Bugs from a while back scratched me bad."

Vanellope had a worried expression on her face, but she didn't buy the story that the strange, glitched out eye was caused by just a Cy-Bug.

"Is that what happens when you're scratched by one?"

"Yes, I suppose so", Pep said calmly.

Even though Vanellope was still suspicious of the random candy citizen, after looking at him for awhile, she sighed and gave her entire attention to the mint candy.

"So… you said something about helping me get something awesome for Ralph?"

Pep smiled.

"Ah, yes! Well, I just so happen to know of an amazing gift that would make Ralph the happiest game character in the world!"

Vanellope lit up at that declaration.

"R-Really?"

"Yes! Do you want to know what it is?"

"Yes!"

He smirked at Vanellope.

"Do you really want to know, President Vanellope?"

Vanellope's brightness dimmed a little when she was asked again.

"Yes! Yes!", Vanellope said twice to mask her annoyance with excitement.

Pep's grin only grew wider.

"Do you really wa-"

"Just tell me already!", Vanellope yelled at the top of her lungs impatiently.

"AH!", Pep yelled, almost falling off the branch," A-Alright. Well, the thing I think you could give Ralph that would make his world is… an upgrade of sorts."

"An… upgrade?"

"Yes! Think about it, Vanellope. Ralph's game is sort of… how do I say… old-looking, right?"

Vanellope scowled at Pep, although not for the fact that he dropped her title out of nowhere. It was because he basically insulted 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'.

"His game is retro. The gamers love it", Vanellope stated in an annoyed tone.

"Loved", Pep corrected, "The players loved the retro style of 'Fix-It Felix. Jr.'"

Pep sat down on the branch and stared off into the distance.

"Look at your game, Vanellope. Beyond the eyes of the players, your world and Ralph's are similar. But to their eyes, Ralph's game is not even on your level. Your game… It's a beautiful, three-dimensional landscape. All this detail, all this life; it's impossible to replicate that through those eight-bit graphics that Ralph's game has."

Vanellope was steaming. She didn't expect one of her citizens to be such a judgemental and biased sweet-based being. She had to mentally, and even physically, hold herself back from tackling the guy and beating him down.

"Ralph doesn't need an upgrade or anything, Pep! His game is perfect the way it is! It has a certain charm to it that makes it stand out from the other retro games in the arcade!"

"But don't you see, Vanellope? There aren't that many retro games left in the arcade. That charm you said that 'Fix-It Felix Jr. has run its course", Pep stated, now facing Vanellope with a serious look, "If Ralph's game doesn't change, that 'charm' is just going to become a gimmick. And like every gimmick, the craze for it will die out soon. Do you want 'Fix-It Felix Jr.', Ralph's home, to die out and get unplugged from the arcade?"

Vanellope looked at Pep horrified.

"I would never want that to happen to Ralph or anyone in his game!"

"Then you have to give Ralph the gift of an upgrade! He needs this upgrade. If his game doesn't change soon, he'll become irrelevant and be removed from our arcade!"

Vanellope scoffed but found she couldn't think of anything to say to argue against Pep.

Pep gave a sad smile to Vanellope.

"You agree with me, don't you, Vanellope?

"... Well, even if I did, what can you do to upgrade his game? What can anyone of us do? We can't upgrade our own games."

Pep chuckled and pulled out what appeared to be a universal serial bus drive, or a USB drive for short.

"What's… that, Pep?", Vanellope asked, a little cautious of the random item pulled out of nowhere.

Pep held the USB drive closer to Vanellope.

"This… This is an internal storage device. It contains an extremely powerful graphics update code that can, well, alter the graphics of a game. Seeing as how your game cabinet can handle your game's 3D graphics, I'm going to assume that Ralph's game cabinet is also able to handle 3D graphics as well."

Vanellope looked at the USB drive with concern.

"Where did you get it?"

"A friend of mine from another arcade. He told me to keep his identity secret since he doesn't want anyone to know he could change the graphics of a game. If everyone knew, the arcades around him would go crazy and ask him to make it for everyone. He made this one for me because he owed me a favor."

"What do you want me to do with this… thing?"

"All you have to do is plug this into Ralph's code in his game's code room, type in this password I'm about to give you, and it should work it's way into everyone else's code as well and give his game a well-deserved overhaul."

"Wait… you want me to go into the 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'' code room?! Are you crazy? That's the reason the whole 'King Candy' mess happened! I'm never going to mess around in a game code room, period!"

Pep sighed and put his hand on Vanellope's shoulder.

"You're not going to 'mess around' in their code room, Vanellope. You're going to give them another chance to survive in our arcade. You know they need it. Look what happened to Qbert and his friends. Do you want that to happen to Ralph?"

"W-Well… No, but-"

"Then you have to trust me, Vanellope. You have to do this. For Ralph."

Vanellope swatted Pep's hand off her shoulder and walked away from him on the branch a little.

"I… don't know, Pep. It just seems so unreal. I can't believe that this USB device could do something amazing like that. And to be honest… I don't trust you. Why would you do this for Ralph and I?"

Pep looked out into the distance longingly for the second time that night.

"I understand how you feel. It's hard to trust someone with an eye like mine."

"T-That's not what I meant-"

Pep laughed a little.

"I know. I know you understand me more than anything, Vanellope. You were an outcast yourself.I know how that feels now. People look at me like I'm a monster. All I ask is for you to trust me. Give me a chance to be more than just the candy in your kingdom that's… different."

Vanellope grit her teeth. On one hand, she hated the idea of having to go inside Ralph's code room. But on the other, if she denied Pep's gift to her to give to Ralph, she'd be just the same as King Candy and the older versions of everyone else. She never wanted to discriminate anyone. After all… she's been discriminated too.

"... Alright, Pep. I'll give you a chance. Everyone deserves one."

Pep beamed widely.

"Thank you, Vanellope. Here… take it. Don't lose it. Ready to hear the password?"

Vanellope nodded, an unnaturally serious look on her face.

"The password is 7S2-I93-21V-9U2-R04."

"Wow. Sounds complicated. Why is it so long?"

"If I happened to lose it, someone else who doesn't deserve it could use it to upgrade their game. It has to stay in the code room permanently after all. So my friend added a really complicated password to make sure only the person who knows the password can use it."

Pep took out a piece of paper and pen, using the pen to quickly jot down the password on the piece of paper. Once he was done, he handed it over to Vanellope.

"Here. I understand it's pretty difficult for most people to remember it. Make sure you rip that piece of paper up after you type it into the screen that's going to pop up after you plug in the USB drive, okay?"

"A-Alright…"

"One more thing, Vanellope."

"What is it, Pep?"

Pep looked towards the exit of Sugar Rush.

"It's nighttime, right? Why don't you make it a surprise for Ralph when he wakes up? I suggest doing it now, since it's pretty late, and I'm sure everyone in the arcade is asleep."

Vanellope smiled at Pep.

"That's not a bad idea, Pep. I think I'm gonna sneak over there now. Thank you for the gift idea, Pep."

Pep smiled back at Vanellope.

"It's no trouble at all, President Vanellope. Send my regards to Ralph, okay?"

"Alright, Pep. I'll catch you later! Don't be afraid to come say hi to me whenever you see me racing! I don't want you to feel like you don't belong in my own kingdom!"

Pep chuckled.

"Of course. Thank you."

Vanellope ran off towards the exit as Pep waved her goodbye. As Vanellope neared the exit, she turns back to see Pep one last time with a grateful smile. However, her smile turned into a confused look when she noticed that Pep had disappeared entirely. She wanted to go back and look for the guy, but she didn't want to waste time and decided to not worry about it.

As she went through the exit of 'Sugar Rush', high up on one of the candy cane trees, was a lone figure watching her leave with an evil grin.

"Let's get things started, shall we… President Vanellope?"

* * *

Vanellope got off the train from Sugar Rush and went into the empty Game Central Station. Before she was able to leave her own station, a red light flashed around her and a light blue and somewhat transparent person appeared in front of her.

"Name?", he asked apathetically.

"Hey Surge. It's me, Vanellope! From Sugar Rush."

"Hello, Miss Von Schweetz. What's your reason for being in Game Central Station so late?"

"I wanna' give Ralph a surprise present for the morning! That's okay, right?"

"That's alright. What's that you got with you?"

"Oh, this is something one of my candy citizens got from someone from another arcade."

Surge looked at it for a second before looking back at his clipboard.

"If it was able to pass through the gate before then it's probably fine. You may proceed to 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'. Have a good night, Miss Von Schweetz."

Surge disappeared and Vanellope ran to the train leading to 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'.

 **…**

Vanellope snuck around in the darkness of 'Fix-It Felix Jr.', looking for any clue as to where the code room could be., and glitching to get around Ralph's game faster. She made sure to be even quieter whenever she looked around Ralph's shack.

"Dang it! Maybe this was a bad idea after all. I don't even know where their code room is!", Vanellope whispered to herself.

Vanellope walked around outside for a bit before quietly sneaking into the Niceland Apartment Complex. She looked around the dimly lit lobby. The night made the Nicelanders' apartment look really mysterious to her. Unfortunately, she didn't really notice anything that screamed 'code room' to her, so she groaned and kicked the wall softly in annoyance.

Once she did, a painting on the clean, white wall fell down because of her kick. She immediately reacted and caught the picture before it hit the ground.

"*Sigh* That was close."

She looked at the picture and smiled. It was a cute picture of Ralph, Felix, and the Nicelanders all posing for the camera. Vanellope laughed at how awkward Ralph was in that fancy tux of his. She could see the sweat on his forehead and his nervous smile.

She looked up to the spot the picture fell from to put it back before noticing a faint blue light blinking slowly. It instantly caught her attention and made her bring her hands towards it, illuminated by the rhythmic pattern of the blue light's blinking. Her eyes grew wider as went closer to the light, it's faint gleam completely filling the entirety of her hazel pupils.

She placed her hand on it and discovered that the wall in front of the light was incredibly thin, which explained why she was able to see it blinking. Vanellope gulped and pushed her hand into the wall, and noticed that it sank into the wall with her push.

 ***Beep!***

"Ah!", Vanellope yelped and fell to the floor. She quickly held her mouth closed and waited for someone to check on what the noise was. Fortunately for her, no one came to check on her, and she watched as the part of the wall she pressed began to mechanically move towards her and shift to the side, revealing a hidden elevator. Vanellope walked towards the silver-colored elevator with blue lights highlighting the edges. She noticed there was a lit button next to the left of the elevator that had a picture of a red arrow pointing downwards. Vanellope pressed it as soon as she saw it and the elevator door opened, waiting for her to enter. Vanellope shrugged.

"W-Well… Here goes nothing", she said nervously.

Vanellope walked inside the elevator and looked around. It was just as silver as the outside of the elevator was. She looked to the entrance and exit of the elevator and noticed at the right side of the door were two button had a red arrow pointing upwards, and the other had the red arrow once again, only it was pointing downwards, like the one outside of the elevator. The button with the red arrow pointing upwards was not lit, while the button with the red arrow pointing downwards was lit. Vanellope assumed it was because there wasn't a floor higher for this elevator in specific. She pressed the button with the red arrow pointing downwards, making the elevator close its door and begin its descent under the surface of 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'.

Eventually, Vanellope saw the elevator doors open to reveal a hallway lit by a bunch of transparent wires emitting blue, digital-like lights connecting into the closed room at the end of the said hallway. Vanellope deducted that the wires transported… something to Ralph's game to make everything work. That meant that she was actually able to find 'Fix-It Felix Jr.''s code room!

Vanellope excitedly jumped around with a large smile. She even glitched around a bit. She had to stop jumping around when she nearly tripped on the smooth and slick metal floor that had the same silver color as the elevator, making a loud squeaking noise. Vanellope felt her heart jump when she almost face-planted to the floor. The noise that came from her shoes quickly sliding across the floor didn't help calm her thoughts either. She stood perfectly still, hoping that no one would catch her at this point because if anyone did find her, she would have no way to explain herself as to why she was in the code room of 'Fix-It Felix Jr.'.

She sighed with relief after not hearing any movement from upstairs. Vanellope walked over to the room closed by two doors. She decided to try and push open the doors. To her surprise, it actually worked. She stepped back in fear, expecting lasers or something to attack her. Fortunately, nothing really happened, other than the two doors creaking. Vanellope looked at the doors questioningly, expecting that getting inside the core of the code room would be a lot harder.

' _I guess it's because this game is pretty old. But really? Not even a password system? I really hope no one else other than them goes in here. Cuz' it's way too unprotected'_ , Vanellope thought to herself.

Vanellope prepared herself before pushing the doors even more open and entering the room. Immediately, she began to float awkwardly in the air.

"Whoa!", she yelped.

She looked below her to see that her legs really had left the floor. Vanellope couldn't help but childishly grin and laugh at the fact she was floating. She cheerfully messed around in the air, doing somersaults and stretching her arms out to mimic an airplane. On one of her somersaults, she gasped at the sight that was right in front of her. It was large collection of codes all gathered up to resemble a sphere that seemed like it was ten times bigger than her height. Heck, it looked like it was even bigger than Ralph. Vanellope felt small as she stared at the large sphere of codes, but nodded with a serious look, knowing that that sphere was her final destination. She moved towards it.

After moving towards it for a few minutes, she realized that she would get there faster if she swam towards it as if she were in water. It was such a weird feeling swimming through air. She would be having more fun if she wasn't focused on putting the USB device into Ralph's code. When she entered the large group of codes, she discovered that there were way too much to look through. She swam through a variety of them, ranging from Nicelands Apartment Complex to the bonus level one, which seemed to be the most recently added one. Vanellope held the bonus level code, with a warm expression on her face. It was already really nice of Ralph to invite the Qbert guys into his game, and it was even nicer that Felix configured this code into the game so the Qbert guys don't have to worry about never regenerating in 'Fix-It Felix Jr.' whenever they die.

Vanellope let go of the bonus level code and continued to look for Ralph's code. She groaned to herself, swimming around in the code room. She wasn't in the room that long, but looking at all the seemingly large amount of individual codes made her want to give up already.

Then Vanellope noticed something.

The character codes were a bit bigger than the codes for things like houses or levels. For example, when she was swimming around in the code room, she bumped into Qbert's code, which was a bit bigger than the code for the Niceland Apartment Complex. This helped decrease the time Vanellope spent looking for Ralph's code, as it turned out that most of the bigger codes were all huddled together in the center of the sphere, and the bigger codes scattered near the outside of the sphere were the newer characters added to the sphere.

Vanellope swam as fast as she could to the center of the sphere and hoped that her assumption about the bigger codes being the character codes were right.

"Ouch!", she yelped.

Vanellope swam a little too fast though and ended up tumbling into one of the big codes in the center. She shook her head to help the pain go away, and looked up at the code she bumped into. She gently turned the code around to see who the code belonged to. A smile grew on her face when she realized that the code she swam headfirst into was the very code she was looking for: Ralph's code, labeled properly as 'Wreck-It Ralph'! It was a bit bigger than the other character codes around it, funnily enough.

' _Probably because he's a large diaper-brain~!'_ , Vanellope thought, snickering to herself.

Vanellope would have grabbed the code with her hands, but Ralph's code was too wide for her to stretch her arms around it. She decided to just float around it and look for the right opening to insert the USB device. Before long, Vanellope was able to find a slot in Ralph's code that seemed like the perfect spot to put the USB device in. Vanellope couldn't help but smile as she thought about how happy Ralph and everyone is going to be when they realized that their game just got upgraded from retro to three-dimensional.

"Okay…", Vanellope said to herself as she brought the USB device closer to the slot, "Here… we… go!"

*Click!*

When Vanellope plugged in the USB device, a blue holographic screen popped up in front of her. The only thing on the screen was this blank space with a text cursor blinking at a reasonable pace and a keyboard. Vanellope nodded, knowing that this was the last step. She pulled out the piece of paper with the password on it that Pep had given to her. She began to type out the password slowly and carefully into the USB device.

"7S2… l93… 21V… ", Vanellope whispered to herself to make sure she typed it in right, "9U2… R04… is that it?"

When she pressed the enter button, the USB denied the password, displaying a huge X over the screen for a few seconds before disappearing, letting Vanellope try again.

"What the-?"

Vanellope looked at the piece of paper with a frown and a focused look and tried to see what she did wrong. After looking at it for awhile, Vanellope's frown turned into a look of realization, and she facepalmed herself.

"Uh doy! That's what I did wrong. I put l instead of I. Hah. Let me just do this again", she said to herself as she erased the password and started to start over.

"7S2… I93… 21V… 9U2… and R04! Is that it?"

*Beep!*

Answering Vanellope was the sound of an approving computer beep.

"Awesome!... Now what?"

Suddenly, Vanellope watched as the screen went devil red and the password she typed in started floating around Ralph's code. Vanellope instinctively backed off in fear.

"Whoa! What's happening?!"

The numbers in the password phased into Ralph's code, fusing themselves within, while the letters in the password merged together and laid on the surface of Ralph's code, and displayed themselves right under Ralph's name. Vanellope watched as the wires connecting Ralph's code to the game turned clear and reveal that the blue lighting that had come out of Ralph's code before turned into a visible red electric current, making a soft crackling noise and chilling Vanellope to the bone.

She turned back to Ralph's code to look at the letters. Each of the separate letters that placed themselves under Ralph's name glowed in a specific pattern, but it was too fast for Vanellope to make out whether or not the pattern was spelling something out. She then focused on what the words had already spelled out when they had formed under Ralph's name on his code. Vanellope was confused at what they spelled out. It seemed very foreign to her.

"... SIVUR?"

* * *

"*Snore* *Snore*"

Ralph was sleeping comfortably in his small shack. The only thing that was actually making noise around him was the occasional snore from himself, and the creaking of his bed when he would move around. It was all calm and peaceful, something Ralph desperately needed in these busy weeks of summer vacation.

 ***ZZZZZZAP!***

" **AHHHH!** "

Immediately after the first zap from the mysterious visible, and strangely solid, red electricity, Ralph opened his eyes and let out a bloodcurdling scream. The sudden electric shocks were so strong and effective, he couldn't think about anything, not even about where the electric shocks came from or what they even were. All he could think about was getting away from them. The red electricity surrounded his body and started zapping him repeatedly. If that wasn't horrible enough for Ralph, the more he struggled to free himself from the electric shock, the more zaps he would receive and every time he moved the electricity would follow his movement as if they were elastic. It was impossible for him to sit still anyway, as the electricity forcibly moved him whenever they shocked him.

Ralph tried to run away, at least to the outside of his shack so he could call for help. But the moment he stood off his bed, the electric shocks began to hurt, even more, making Ralph fall down to one knee and close his eyes in pain. When he opened them, all he could see was red. Wait... he was a kid-friendly video game character though; he wasn't programmed to bleed. Ralph quickly realized that the red that he was seeing wasn't blood; it was the red electricity growing in number and beginning to circle around him, closing in on him slowly but steadily. Ralph tried doing the best thing he could do: wreck his way out. Even with all the pain he was in he managed to throw a punch towards the sphere of electricity.

"Ah!"

Ralph brought his hand back to him as fast as he threw his punch. He grunted, annoyed that his punch wasn't enough to throw the electricity off him at least a bit. Ralph was starting to lose consciousness. The pain was becoming too overwhelming. He couldn't even try to get away anymore. He was still down on one knee, just trying his best to stay conscious. Ralph felt his knee buckle and finally collapse. To keep himself from falling face first into the floor, he stretched his arms out and held himself up. He clenched his eyes shut in pain.

* * *

Vanellope was still frozen in place, pondering frightfully about the letters under Ralph's name and the red electricity replacing the blue light in Ralph's code and it's wires.

"D-D-Did I do something wrong?", Vanellope asked herself.

She looked at the now red holographic screen to see if anything new popped up. To her dismay, the only thing new was the same red X that covered the screen when she typed in the wrong password. Only this time, the red X stayed on the screen permanently.

Suddenly, Vanellope heard the crackle of electricity increase in volume. She turned her head back up at the wires coming out of Ralph's code to see the amount of red electricity increase. Seeing this finally snapped Vanellope out of her frozen state.

"This isn't right! Something's wrong. I gotta' take out the USB!"

Vanellope quickly swam over to the USB device and put a hand on it to grasp it and pull it out of Ralph's code. Once she put her hand on it, however, she was zapped by some of the red electricity.

"Ah!", Vanellope yelped.

Vanellope took her hand off the USB device straightaway and held her hand, making an upset face and expressing her pain with an "Ow!" She frowned at the USB device. Soon more electricity was beginning to come out of the USB device and into Ralph's code and wires. Vanellope stared horrified at the sight. Eventually, she began to see the numbers from the password begin to slowly crawl up with the electricity inside of the wire. Vanellope's mind was at once filled with the idea of those numbers doing something horrible to Ralph. She scowled, her determination and persistence growing.

"No one's gonna' mess with Ralph while President Vanellope is around!", Vanellope declared proudly.

She swam back over to the USB, and spit into both of her hands, rubbing both of them together.

"Let's do this. For Ralph!"

Vanellope grasped onto the USB device with both of her hands.

"Grr…"

Doing this promptly shocked her, causing her to experience the electrifying pain once again. But Vanellope grit her teeth tightly, trying her best to resist the stinging from the electricity. Instead of the electricity making her lessen her hold on the USB device, she held tighter and started to pull out the USB device. It was almost completely stuck in Ralph's code as if it were locked in place, so she had to use all the strength that she could muster.

"Come on… Come on… Come on!"

Vanellope felt the USB device slipping out more and more, encouraging her to keep going. Because of her going way beyond her pain tolerance, Vanellope started to glitch uncontrollably. So when a part of the red electricity whipped her as she glitched at the same time, it mixed with her code, turning the tip of the electricity purple. Soon, the purple color spread to the rest of the electricity, and it followed all the way up into Ralph.

Vanellope took no notice of this, however. All she could focus on right now was pulling out the thing causing all of this trouble, even with so many now purple whip-like electric currents attacking her at once.

"Almost… got it…"

* * *

Ralph grunted and forced himself up, fighting back the immense amount of pain. He was hunched over, clearly tired from struggling so much in one night. But determination was the most evident expression on his face.

"I don't know what this is...", Ralph said to himself to help keep himself awake, "But I'm not going to let it do whatever it wants to me!"

He winded up a punch that would be the strongest one he would ever throw. Despite not being able to think rationally, he pondered to himself that this might be his last punch he would ever give, so he began to think of all of his friends, the ones he was programmed with and the ones he had made. He thought of Felix and how they had finally come to understand one another. He thought of the Nicelanders, and how they finally treated him like an equal after so long. He thought of everyone at Bad-Anon, and how they were great friends to him and did their best to help him realize that being a bad guy didn't mean he had to be a bad guy. He thought of Calhoun, and how happy he was for her to be happy and married to Felix. Finally, Ralph thought of Vanellope. Their memories together when he was stuck in Sugar Rush for a while flashed quickly in his thoughts. He remembered when he first met her to the moment where he had to leave her to go back to his game. And even after that, they had stayed the best of friends, supporting each other in any endeavor they had to overcome. They needed each other…

Ralph glared at the electricity that had almost finished completely forming around his body. Ralph couldn't wait anymore. He wasn't going to let this… thing… do anymore to him. He had friends who needed him. He had people relying on him to play the role of the bad guy. The last thought that appeared in his mind before it shut down because of the immense pain was his infamous quote. Because his mind pretty much shut off on him, he didn't notice the red electricity turn purple.

"I'm… gonna'... **WRECK-IT!** ", Ralph yelled as loud as he could, desperate to get rid of the pain by hyping himself up to be strong enough to do something to the electricity.

Ralph threw his winded up punch at the sphere. It resisted his punch at first, it feeling like it was pushing Ralph's punch back, but Ralph saw an unnatural crack start to grow on the sphere of electricity. That was enough motivation for him to push his fist onto the sphere even harder.

* * *

Vanellope pulled the USB device to the point where she felt like she was going to break it. Tears were streaming down her face because of the pain, but her determined scowl was still as strong as ever.

"Come on! Get… out of... Ralph's code!"

After what seemed like an eternity, Vanellope pulled out the USB device. Because of how hard she was pulling, she nearly flew off far away from Ralph's code, even spinning and flipping around awkwardly in the air. Once she reorganized herself, she noticed that the pain that she was being tortured with was gone and that she was holding the USB device in her hands. She smiled in relief and held it up to her face.

"Got it!"

The purple electricity immediately disappeared, and the letters under Ralph's name began to evaporate away, also disappearing entirely. Soon, the peaceful blue light reappeared and Ralph's code was seemingly back to normal.

Vanellope sighed. She did it. She stopped whatever that was from doing something to Ralph. She wanted to be mad, especially since she was manipulated by Pep, but she was too tired to feel anything else.

Vanellope tucked the USB device in her front pocket, floated over to one of the wires connected to Ralph's code, and wrapped her arms around it. She instantly fell asleep.

* * *

Ralph pushed harder into the sphere. He felt himself want to give up and give in to the electricity, but he was way too persistent for his own good. Fortunately for Ralph, that persistence paid off, especially when he got shocked by the sphere actually breaking into pieces. Ralph gaped at the sight of electricity floating around him in pieces as if time was frozen. Ralph chuckled. Everything seemed alright now. The electricity wasn't zapping him anymore, and it began to decrease in number.

Suddenly, the purple electric bits frozen around began to circle around him rapidly. Ralph flinched at the sudden movement and jumped up in surprise.

"What the- Now what?", Ralph muttered to himself annoyed.

He watched as they went faster and faster until they spread outwards away from him, and then just as fast as they spread out, came back in onto Ralph's body enveloping him in an electric grasp. It went in so fast, Ralph didn't have time to react. The pain wasn't as great as it was before, but it still made Ralph feel disgruntled. And also unlike the previous red electric shocks, this time, the purple electric bits weren't elastic-like. They were rigid and strong enough to restrain Ralph in place.

After a few moments of being restrained, the purple electric bits began to slowly phase into Ralph's body. As they went further inside him, Raph felt his eyes become heavy. He struggled just to keep awake, but something inside him told him that the fight was over. He was just lost as to whether or not he won the fight.

The purple electric bits disappeared fully into Ralph's body, leaving no visible marks on Ralph. When they had finally entered his body, Ralph collapsed on his back onto his bed, knocked out.

Once Ralph fell asleep, a strange glitch-like purple aura began resonating around his body. Data codes were floating and evaporating out of this aura. It seemed very machine-like, and it would have continued to look machine-like had it not been for the sudden appearance of sweets in the form of pixels coming out of the aura as well. The aura went on evaporating in the air around Ralph before disappearing. Just after the aura dispersed, Ralph's body began to glow a pure-white light.

* * *

"... **WRECK-IT!** "

The sounds of shattering glass followed the yell from Ralph.

"W-What was that?!"

Felix immediately woke up at Ralph's scream and the sound of glass shattering. He shook his head rapidly and looked out his window to look down at Ralph's shack. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but Felix knew that this was the third scream from him just this night. Something must be wrong.

Felix ran out of his bedroom in the Nicelands Apartment Complex and ran over to his closest neighbor's room. He quickly knocked on their door.

"Hey! Gene! Wake up!"

After a few moments, a Nicelander opened the door and walked out the room, clearly tired.

"*Yawn* Felix? What's wrong?", Gene asked.

"I think something's wrong with Ralph. He's screamed three times tonight. That's really weird."

Gene shook his head to wake himself up and looked at Felix with a serious look.

"Really? That does sound weird… You sure he isn't having a really bad nightmare?"

"I thought that at the first and second scream, but that third scream sounded… desperate. And right after the scream, it sounded like glass shattered or something."

A worried look grew on Gene's face.

"... Alright, what do you want me to do?", Gene asked.

"Can you get everyone else to meet me in front of Ralph's shack? I'm going to get Qbert and his friends. I think something is happening to Ralph. And if he can't handle it, we're going to need everyone's help."

Gene nodded and quickly dashed over to the next neighbor. Felix nodded approvingly and ran down the stairs of the apartment, on his way outside to Qbert's neighborhood.

* * *

Felix, the Nicelanders, and Qbert and his friends barged into Ralph's shack, prepared for anything that might have been attacking Ralph. However, they were not prepared to see Ralph asleep on his bed with a strange light glowing from him.

"What in the world?", Felix exclaimed as he and the others stared in wonder and awe at the light enshrouding Ralph.

The light covering Ralph got increasingly brighter, eventually causing Felix and the others to cover their eyes from the light. Slowly, but surely, the bright light began to fade. Felix was the first to uncover his eyes and look towards Ralph to see what happened.

"M-My stars… ", Felix exclaimed.

On the soft bed that was bent upwards in a V-shape because of Ralph's weight was a small and young looking boy, who just so happened to look almost like what Ralph would look like as a kid, and wore the same clothing as him as well. The Nicelanders looked at him with horror while Qbert and his friends looked at him confused. Felix was the only one who was able to walk towards Ralph, since everyone else was in a frozen state of terror or confusion. Felix gulped, and placed his hand on the boy, hoping to the creators that this wasn't Ralph. He started to shake the boy.

"U-Um. E-Excuse me?"

The boy shook a little and made a groan before opening his eyes slowly. He looked over at Felix, and a perplexed look appeared on his face. It grew even more perplexed when he saw everyone else standing by his door. He shook his head and looked at Felix with relief, not noticing that Felix was incredibly tense.

"Oh, Felix", the boy said with an adorably high pitched voice, "You wouldn't believe the nightmare I just had. There was this weird red electricity around me and it started zapping me like crazy. 'Course, it couldn't bring me down! My wrecking skills came in handy like always."

Felix went wide-eyed.

"Y-You're not Ralph… Are you?"

The boy looked at Felix with an raised eyebrow.

"That's a weird question to ask. Of course, I'm Ralph!"

Felix started to hyperventilate a little and backed away from Ralph, worrying him. Ralph stood up.

"Hey Felix, are you okay? You look a little… pale?"

Ralph looked at what he was standing on and saw that he was right on top of his bed. What was weird was that his bed was… bigger than him. If that wasn't weird enough, he looked at his feet and saw that they were smaller than usual. He chuckled uncomfortably.

"T-That's weird. I don't remember my bed being so big. Or my feet being… this small."

He hopped off his bed, but when he landed, he stumbled a little.

"W-Whoa. What's wrong with- WHAT!?"

When Ralph brought his hand up to his face to feel his forehead, he immediately noticed that his hands were smaller than they usually were. They were still relatively big, but not Ralph-sized big.

Ralph was so shocked by the size of his hands that he fell on his butt. He expected to hear a loud thud, but he didn't hear anything. It was like he wasn't… that heavy…

Ralph looked up at Felix from the floor, clearly as confused as he and everyone else there was. He stood up, and saw that when he stood up straight, he still had to look up at Felix, since he only reached up to Felix's shoulder. Felix watched in horror as his best friend and even brother realize that something was wrong.

"W-What the-", Ralph said before interrupting himself.

He quickly ran behind Felix and to his sink to look at the mirror. When he got to it, he had to climb up it to even see the mirror. When he reached the top of the sink countertop, he instantly locked eyes with a younger version of himself. Ralph went wide eyed. He couldn't believe it. Ralph tried to touch his cheek, and he felt the touch. He brushed his hand through his hair. He felt that too. He punched himself in the face.

"OUCH!", Ralph yelped.

He felt that too.

After recuperating, Ralph stared at the mirror and himself in dread. He grasped the top of his head with his two hands tightly.

" **What the heck happened to me?!** "

* * *

 **Hey guys! I hope you enjoyed my first chapter of Wrecking With A Pinch of Sugar! Some things I want to point out real quick.**

 **One: I know that's not how upgrading graphics works. I just made it so Vanellope in this story doesn't.**

 **Two: 8 Bit graphic games are just as fun as 3D games.**

 **Thanks for reading, guys! I hope you look forward to the future chapters.**

 **-Devumaru**


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